seeing

Perspective is a strange thing, what you see depends on where you are looking from.

We all feel a bit flat at the moment. Holidays feel long gone replaced by the usual work and school rhythms. Colin begins a particularly busy couple of months, a full schedule of work commitments, perhaps a tad too many! Johanna begins again the task of juggling school and work and the interruption of travelling to and from Melbourne (we head South again on Wednesday to get our family fix and also to celebrate Zac’s birthday). The realisation that our time of living on the Sunshine Coast is finite and that each day brings us closer to the end of the year. These things sit heavy at times.

And then we look up and out and around and we remind ourselves of what we have here and now, how lucky we are to have today and that most likely tomorrow will take care of itself. Each day offers us the opportunity to see; to see something new or to see something in a different way. A different seeing can help us to have a different feeling. A different seeing can bring greater understanding and compassion. A different seeing can be the beginning of change.

And a different seeing can be as simple as taking a shell and looking, really looking, all the way around…

along the way

Johanna has decided to make use of my old camera – to practise taking video along with the odd photo or two. Our late afternoon walks have been infrequent of late – cold weather (for Caloundra), wind and the early setting sun all contributing to our tendency to stay indoors. But there are still times when we are drawn out; a coloured sky, stillness and calmness, warmth in the late afternoon sun and the ever present urge to be near the sea – to stretch our legs, walk the familiar paths and be filled with the sounds, sights and smells of the coast.

This week there have been two of us, camera in hand (I am still having fun with my little point and shoot), stopping along the way, each attempting to capture something of the moment that is. We walk, we sit, we talk, we listen, we look; we breathe deeply and allow the beauty of this place to fill us up. Johanna’s comment as we walked one afternoon last week, “How can we give this up next year?”

a first

Johanna decided to have a go at capturing some video from Byron Bay. Here is a look at one of her first attempts. It feels like so long ago and we have been back all of three days.

byron bay

the well worn path from Clarke's Beach Caravan Park to 'the point'

A few days before we came to Byron Bay I bought a little point and shoot camera, one that will fit in my pocket. I have decided to experiment with trading some quality for convenience and embracing the freedom of quick snap shots over considered and purposeful photographs. It is a work in progress.

This time around Byron Bay is a mixture of sameness and difference.

Things that are the same – our usual caravan spot, regular and familiar friends and faces, walking to the lighthouse, spotting whales and dolphins, sunset drinks on the deck, the Sunday Market, surfing, ice cream from ‘In The Pink’, a visit to Brunswick heads…

the lighthouse

one of the lighthouse observation decks

looking over Tallows and Suffolk beaches

Brunswick Heads

Brunswick Heads

Brunswick Heads

Brunswick River

Things that are different – the sand that had disappeared from the beach last year creating steep faces has returned and with it a gentle sloping beach, lots of sun and hardly a drop of rain and as a result very cold nights and no spectacular sunsets and for the first time at Byron Bay Colin and I are on our own for a week.

This last one feels a bit strange. Byron Bay has always been a family event, our kids coming and going along with their partners and friends, our caravan overflowing, booking an extra site and setting up tents, cooking for a hungry hoard, junk food and 500 in the evenings…. This time Johanna was with us for 5 days and now we are on our own. It is taking me some time to adjust and I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t shed a tear or two. It is not the same, but it is still good, just different and we are slowly setting new rhythms and patterns for two….

on the top of Mount Warning

A quick power nap. I do believe that within two minutes of lying down
snores could be heard from beneath the hat!